Yes, that's exactly what everyone thinks. Then they think "wait, I don't need to go to the bank today!"

It's all about reminding them of the thing they forgot. It's why coca-cola advertises.

You are entitled to your point of view, of course. And this POV will put us well on the way to decreasing the number of cyclists.

But I don't think that the OP was trying to decrease the number of cyclists. I think he was interested in increasing the number.

30 years or so ago, Copenhagen had very few cyclists, and people were skeptical that the city's cycling initiatives would do anything to change the behavior of car-centric Copenhageners. (I am not making this up.) So I don't see how the fact that they are "there" and we are "here" has any particular relevance to anything. If we want to increase the number of cyclists, we should look at what places that have successfully increased the number of cyclists have done.

I agree. We have a choice to promote travel by bicycle and considering the many benefits of travel by bicycle we can see what's worked, what hasn't and what we should do.

from, http://www.i-sustain.com/learningCen...%20Article.htm

so, we've concluded that...

1. advocacy should mean encouraging more people to ride bikes
2. helmets may or may not dissuade cycling, but the freedom to choose is probably a good thing
3. infrastructure is nice
4. the more cyclists, the safer
5. looking like a 'normal' (ugh, i hate that word) person on a bike makes riding the bike look more normal than looking like a hipster or spandex fred
6. being polite to others (motorists, peds &c) gives cycling a nice aura that helps adoption.
7. closetbiker's avatar always makes me think "look, it's gerry hannah from the subhumans"... although i have no data to support this notion.

Oh c'mon! I'm from the same era and the same time frame, but I didn't go to jail for taking part in a bombing! (can you say, "domestic terrorist"?)

The band I played in was considered by Gerry's fans as the polar opposite of what he was involved in although to the general public, we were part of the same "revolution" of independent recordings. The difference between us was we were signed to A&M records after they heard our self-produced record and Gerry's groups continued to self produce.

my band http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-td5LsqOt_I (Check out my yellow pants and ski-boots!)

The Subhumans http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uG2T...eature=related

and besides, even though we played the same bass (for a time), my hair looked far more like Farrah's, than Gerrys (and anyway, I was trying to emulate Roger Glover)

http://mazeofthoughts.files.wordpres...ah_fawcett.jpghttp://dondenton.ca/blog/wp-content/...y-hannah-x.jpghttp://i283.photobucket.com/albums/k...ogerGlover.jpg

hm. i read this before your edit and was about 80% convinced you were talking about the payolas with a distant, distant second guess at 54-40.... and was basically just waiting to go home and check the labels on the ol' record collection to confirm a&m-ness

We recorded at Little Mountain sound with Ron Obvious (now working Bryan Adams Studio in Gastown, Vancouver). Bob Rock was the other engineer (Payolas) and we were good friends.

The Payolas opened for us a couple of times.

54-40 were the "new" guys at the time. I was getting out when they were getting in.

We're on a couple of sites

http://www.canadianbands.ca/Brandon%20Wolf.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barney_...gendary_Hearts

A&M-ness...

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1180/...87b7d4b9_o.jpg

a friend at work (who collects records) found one of ours in the bargain bin for something like a buck.

i strongly believe i have a legendary hearts cassette somewhere...

More Canadian (Vancouver) music/cycling trivia.

Prisms' (a best selling band from the late 70's) singer (Ron Tabak) died on 25 December 1984, one day after a brain hemorrhage he suffered from a cycling accident.

(I think -not sure- he was drunk at the time he had the collision with the car)

Ok if this is devolving into a Canadian pop music discussion.....how about appreciation for 2 blasts from the past....

"Sweet City Woman" the stampeders

And Edward Bear and the "Last song" series (and the last song wasn't)

and if you want to devolve further....how about quirky shows on canadian tv:

The Friendly Giant (wonderful show)
The magic boomerang (aussie import)
Skippy the Kangaroo (aussie import)
Hangtown 10 (may not be right...about a bunch of kids with a fort...another aussie import)
"totally forgot the name" but a show about a french hero who uses a biblical sling as a weapon
The Don Tremaine show
The old dutch potato chip show

I'm from montana, but got the Lethbridge alberta tv station better the Great falls stations...so for many year I watched canadian tv.

and in high school candian AM stations had better music than the local stations...


back to the original point: ride your bike.....do a utility run and have fun

Mr. Dressup?

http://www.edithjolicoeur.com/attach...Mr_Dressup.jpg

Don Messer's Jubilee?

https://www.gov.ns.ca/nsarm/virtual/.../images/20.jpg

(I think Sweet City Woman was the first song I learned on guitar)

*ride lots*

didn't you read the part where he said we are trying to change the image of cycling from a recreational activity or sport to a normal everyday activity, or did you just skip over that?

The proper attire for normal everyday cycling is your normal everyday clothes. work in an office? then it's a business suit or business casual, depending...work in a blue collar profession? then it's jeans and a T-shirt, and so on...

Here's a great lecture advocating cycling

Cycling for Everyone

John Pucher, professor of planning and public policy, Rutgers University
May 15, 2008, Vancouver

http://www.sfu.ca/city/city_pgm_video020.htm


"If you ask the general population why they don't cycle, the number one reason, by far, is the perception that cycling is unsafe"

"the Dutch, Danes and Germans do not wear ~, yet have a much higher degree of safety"

"the director of cycling for the city of Amsterdam, also for the city of Groningen and for the nationwide cycling federation all said they are so much against ~ use law because we feel it it discourages cycling"

"Certain" proponents exaggerate the risks of cycling, thus deterring many people who then see cycling as dangerous and one of the very few things that has definitively been shown to improve the safety of cyclists, is having more cyclists on the road.

and again... if you want to encourage humans to do or not do something the absolute worst thing you can do is pass a law limiting or restricting said behaviour. doing so only replaces a meaningful shift in attitude with a dull and mindless compliance.

witness smoking.

no, seriously, go witness it. you can see it happening in windswept parking lots in -40 weather. why are all the smokers out there in the cold and wind? because the law probably states that they can't smoke inside or within x meters of a door or within radar-sighting distance of anyone under 18 or whatever the law is. of course, these laws are designed to harass smokers into becoming non-smokers and, of course, they do no such thing. if you passed a law that said smokers could only partake on the top of a speeding train there'd be line-ups six deep waiting to leap on the passing amtrack express.

now, having said that, you will probably notice that every time you mention smoking to a smoker (provided you're not a pompous ass about it, of course), the first thing they always do is apologize profusely for their habit and swear they're planning on quitting pending this or that pre-condition. they are aware that culturally smoking is not really acceptable and are apologetic about violating this social guideline.

so what do we conclude from this: the law enforces compliance (smoking in the parking lot) and cultural acceptance (or non-acceptance as the case may be) is actually presented as a motivator for change (whether the change ever happens, of course, is a different story... but the motivation exists nonetheless).

this, of course, can be easily extrapolated bike helmets. if we make helmet-wearing the law, people will grudgingly comply... probably by taking their cars and leaving both bike and helmet in the garage. if we make wearing a helmet the social norm, well, then people might actually do it, and enjoy it.

that's your challenge for today. go get on with it.

I find exaggerating the risks of cycling, while ignoring cyclings benefits, runs counter to advocating for cycling.

The Tab Hunter show

and there was a show featuring maritime music (nova scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland) that I recall as being pretty good.

I can't remember Tab Hunter, but who can forget The Tommy Hunter Show?

http://www.lightfoot.ca/hunter81.jpg

That would be numerically impossible. There are perhaps 4 or 5 of us. ('roadies' don't count) I don't meet any other people with even the slightest bit of interest in riding a bike around town.

I have absolutely NO interest whatsoever in 'advocating' the wrong kind of people causing chaos by noodling around in traffic on clunky bikes without helmets. This kind of irresponsible behavior will cause responsible bikers a major headache, and may see us legislated off the road altogether. Responsible cycling behavior has to fit the realities of the location.

I'm not in Europe, so all this Euro-talk is irrelevant.

it's only irrelevant if you have no interest in improving conditions for cycling where you live.

I knew I shouldn't have mentioned the H word. Despite all the passion on this subject (myself included) I truly think it is not the critical driver one way or the other.

Ok, back to the main point: ride ride ride. First as this is BF,we are not representative of the genreal publiic, but I am willing to bet that there are lot of us who do lots of recreational biking (go out for exercise, do group ride, go do some single track) but never do an errand (go grab cream for coffee, go to the drugstore, etc) or commute.

I used to never do errands, because my "nice" bike was not set up to just throw a leg over and go, at minimum I needed to put on the elf shoes. So I rebuilt an old bike a couple of years ago.....(I've posted it more than a few times) that I could just hop on and ride.

I have been counting other cyclists on my commute this week and i see 1 or 2 or maybe 3. Admittedly this is summer vacation season and my workplace is not located with ton's of other business, but we are talking flat commute, good bike lanes,(curtner and Leigh ave for san jose types) and weather that can't be beat. it is simply sad not to see more commuters.

so if you don't have a bike you can just ride......go hit craigslist or checkout shops for last years models and add to you stable....

ride and have fun

OK so my memory is going...It was a long time ago, I was little and the tv was black and white ;)

I've made a concerted effort to run errands on my bike for the past few years.

Always commuted, but there are lots of other trips where I can use the bike, and now I do.

"the best way to be an effective advocate for cycling" is to advocate for elimination of zoning laws that reduce housing density. A bicycle is a tool people who live within 3mi or so of their objective use for tranpsortation.

You are correct

I've lived in low housing density areas most of my life and it was never a problem. Low density of housing meant low density of cars, fewer busy intersections and usually wide streets with no parking on the sides. It's more about how the transportation infrastructure and community structure are designed (or in the present case not designed). In the US you'll never get housing within 3 miles of anything (except public transportation nodes if you're lucky) in this day and age. It just isn't possible.